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Most of us love a good fairytale. And then there’s the tale of Dyhemia Young, a teenager from San Francisco’s Bayview district.

Young was invited to the coveted wild card invitation to the Susan Polgar Girls’ Invitational, a prestigious chess tournament held at Texas Tech University in Lubbock. But there was a problem: Young couldn’t be found. Her home life had been unstable for a couple years, and none of her old numbers or addresses worked. So mentors, teachers, and even the police got involved in the search.

They finally tracked her down at a group home – a foster home – in East Palo Alto, with less than a week to go until the start of the tournament. But there was another problem: Dyhemia couldn’t actually afford to go to the tournament.

Luckily, a story about her on the front page of the LA Timesled to a flood of donations that paved her way to Texas.

It sounds like “happily ever after,” but the tale of the San Francisco Chess Cinderella is actually a lot more complicated. KALW’s Jen Chien has this story.

* * *

SUSAN POLGAR: Don’t make the move – this is the most important part of it – don’t make the move until you see me in front of your board.

JEN CHIEN: Ten girls are sitting in front of 10 chess boards at a long bank of tables. Most of them are under 10 years old, in pigtails and headbands, but at the far end of the tables sits a lone teenager with stylish side-swept bangs. That’s Dyhemia Young.

I’m at the Norcal House of Chess in Fremont, watching a “simul,” or simultaneous exhibition. That means all the girls at the table tonight are playing against one chess star. Tonight, that star is Grandmaster Susan Polgar. Cameras are rolling, taking video that will later be posted on Polgar’s many chess websites and YouTube. Amidst the hoopla, Young sits calmly, waiting to make her first move.

POLGAR: So, what I’m gonna do is, I’m gonna start the first round. I’m gonna start right here with Dyhemia, and then move on…

One of the people wielding a camera tonight is Lisa Suhay, who’s flown in from Virginia to attend the event. Suhay, a children’s book author and youth chess organizer is behind a lot of the online buzz about Young. The two met at a tournament in Texas. Actually Suhay’s the one who contacted the LA Times, which led to Young being splashed across its front page.

LISA SUHAY: I called the editor.

Suhay came up with the “Chess Cinderella” name, and she’s been working it all over the internet. She even calls herself Young’s “Fairy Godmother” in one article. Suhay believes that continued media attention can save Young from getting lost in the system like so many foster kids do.

SUHAY: It’s a big system, it’s a slow-moving system. Even though all of the people care very much, they’re stuck with the system. I think it’s important to keep the spotlight on a positive story and on the fact that when everyone got together and helped this one child, it had this huge positive ripple effect.

Young entered the foster care system two years ago after some serious conflicts with her mom. Since then, she’s been bounced from placement to placement, even spending a short stint in juvenile hall (she disobeyed a court mandate to return to her mom’s house). Playing chess helped her find some stability. Her mentor Adisa Banjoko runs the Hip Hop Chess Federation at John O’Connell High School. He sees the game as a way Young can focus her energy. Even though Young received a scholarship to Texas Tech through Polgar’s tournament, Banjoko is not so sure more media attention is what she needs.

ADISA BANJOKO: A lot of pressure was put on her to try to be this or be that, and everybody was trying to turn her journey into a fairy tale. And her journey is very real, her journey is not over.

Young is currently living at the East Palo Alto Teen Home, awaiting yet another foster home placement. She just started her junior year at a new school, and though she’s working hard, statistics for foster kids like her are not favorable. Nationally, youth in foster care are 44% less likely than their peers to graduate from high school. As they get older, it gets even more daunting. In California, 65% of youth aging out of foster care have no place to live. Young will age out in less than three years – a stark reality compared with the Cinderella story that’s been attached to her.

Sheila George operates the group home where Young currently lives.

SHEILA GEORGE: I don’t know about the Cinderella part of this chess, but my main thing now is to get her back on target for school, get her grounded in school, so she can then think.

In the kitchen, an employee is frying chicken and potatoes in a huge cast iron pan to feed the four foster girls who live there. They’re all teenagers. One has a baby.

Young’s mom is there, too – for a visit and a meeting with the social worker, therapist, and attorney on her daughter’s case. She’s uneasy about Young’s newfound fame.

DYHEMIA’S MOTHER: I’m not too sure about the media, I’m not really thrilled about that. ‘Cause I don’t want them to pull her in the wrong direction, might pull her in the wrong direction, she might stumble on something. She’s only 15.

YOUNG: This is my dresser, got my teddy bear… And I like parrots ‘cause they talk a lot of mess…

At an age when girls need stability, Young doesn’t have much. She tells me when she needed glasses, it took two years to arrange for a prescription. She worries about where she’ll live next month. For the moment, she shares an upstairs bedroom with a girl she’s known only a few months.

YOUNG: This is my drawer, this is where I keep basically all my chess containments. This is my board, my Lubbock bag, my hair product, Chess Master edition…

The room is small but tidy – typical teenage girl: a flat iron near a big mirror. Snacks stashed near the head of her bed. Young also has mementos from the chess tournament up on the walls.

YOUNG: She got her side with her decorations, my side with my decorations, my newspapers, the signs, “Welcome Dyhemia Young, we support you” – I got that from when I was on my way to Texas, when I got off the plane. I had three posters, people was giving me flowers, posters, taking pictures with me I’m so famous!

For a child who can feel forgotten, it’s kind of a dream come true. Still, with so many people focusing their attention on her, Young says it’s hard not to feel the pressure.

YOUNG: It’s pressure to be the person that I want to be, pressure to have my little sister look up to me and be the person that she wants me to be, and then it’s pressure just to be in the system and have them on my back, and be the person that they want me to be. I’m like: Can I just be myself?

BANJOKO: If she can finish high school, I think she can go out and be a really devastating person at whatever she chooses. But the real tragedy, and we have to be honest about this, is that if she does not graduate, if her household is not made more stable, she absolutely could be another statistic. And that’s my fear, that all of this hype, and all of these gifts are just gonna end up with her being incarcerated, or worse, and I don’t want that for her, I don’t want that for her at all.

Young has her own thoughts as to what kind of ending – fairytale or not – her story should have.

YOUNG: I more identify with the “diamond in the rough” more than the Cinderella story. I mean, some people may look at my story and think, “Well, she is kind of a Cinderella.” No people, that’s just my name, that is not what I am, that is not who I am. I am a diamond in the rough.

CHIEN: Why is that more accurate?

YOUNG: Because a diamond has to be pressure put on, and you have to mold it and shape it and shine it to get it to be a diamond. And I’m still going through my pressure and molding and you know, all the shining and stuff. Probably my shining will be more in my college years… But no, I’m going through all of that to become that diamond and when I become that diamond y’all, I will be one of the top lawyers, one of the best judges, or even on the Supreme Court. Y’all going see me again, don’t worry.

Back in Fremont, at the Norcal House of Chess, the simul is about to begin.

In chess, every move opens up new opportunities and obstacles. The best players look far ahead in the game, considering all of their possibilities. Young has made it this far. She eyes the board intently. Her hand inches slowly toward a chess piece and hovers above it for a moment…